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MOUNTAIN WEST CONFERENCE WOMEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 7, 2007

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA

THE MODERATOR: We're joined by Brigham Young University head coach Jeff Judkins, student-athletes Mallary Gillespie and Melinda Johnsen.
Coach, if you want to start with some opening remarks.
COACH JUDKINS: We're glad we pulled this off tonight. It's hard playing Air Force. They're so well-coached and disciplined and play so hard. If you're not ready to play, they'll come out and punch you and fight. You know, I think my team knew that tonight.
Of course, losing Dani Wright early in the game was a scary moment. But I think you saw tonight that we have other players that can step it up. I was really proud of our team. I thought a couple players realized they had to do a little bit more offensively. I think they took it upon their shoulders. These two young ladies next to me I think really took it upon themselves to look a little bit more at the basket.
But I'm real happy for my team. It's good to see Cheesman and Cassie and Shawnee get some good minutes tonight and get some confidence. Ashley has worked very hard. To be able to come in tonight and get some quality minutes I really think will help her confidence for this tournament.
THE MODERATOR: Let's have questions for the student-athletes.

Q. Mallary, what passed between the players when Dani went down?
MALLARY GILLESPIE: Huge part of our offense, big defender, helps out tons. We knew like right off the bat we had to step it up in different ways and help each other out more. We all got together, we're all right; we can still do this. Just need to slow down a little bit and look to score different ways and defend in different ways.
Granted, we have been able to be in like foul trouble this year, so it wasn't too new because she's been out with foul trouble a bunch this year so we've been kind of experienced in that.
But we knew we had to step it up as soon as she went out.

Q. Melinda, not normally like you to be looking for your shot like that. How important could that be to the team for you to be looking for more of those shots this weekend and in the future?
MELINDA JOHNSEN: Don't kid yourself. There's only three shots in there (smiling).
I know for my team I'm kind of unselfish I guess you could say when it comes to the offensive end. I feel confident in what I do offensively. I know when the shot's there for me, I'm going to take it.
Yeah, like Mal said, when one of your players goes down that you're looking to go to a lot you start looking at different things and you make adjustments. When she went down, I think it opened things up for us because, you know, usually everyone's worrying about Kubik. It kind of freed things up for us a little.

Q. Do you know what the status of Dani Wright is? How do you like your chances to win the tournament without her?
MELINDA JOHNSEN: I think for right now she looks like she's going to be back for us. Just kind of both Shawnee and her got just some tweaks in their ankles. They should be back for us on Friday.
THE MODERATOR: Ladies, we'll let you go. Thank you.
COACH JUDKINS: Thank you, ladies.
THE MODERATOR: Questions for Coach Judkins.
COACH JUDKINS: Basically I think Mallary hit it on the head with that same question. We've been used to Kubik being in foul trouble a lot. This team has had to deal with it. The reason I didn't play her in the second half is because the trainer told me if I didn't play her she'd have a lot better chance of recovering and playing on Friday.
I told the trainer, No matter what, if we were going to lose the game I wasn't going to put her in the game. That's why I went in at halftime and I really got into Riley and Cassie King and said, Hey, I'm not playing her. It's up to you two. You better step it up or I'm going to go small. I'll go five smalls and run five-man motion, trap, and do those things.
I think by those things I got Riley a little fired up, realized she needs to take the load because next year it's going to be her. It's going to be her in the paint scoring it.
That's what's so good about this team. I think you just hear the two, they take what the TV gives them. They've been that way the whole year. One night it's Mallary, one night it's Keele, Slade, Kubik. I think that's why this team has been special. Hasn't been just one person. It's been a team effort.
It's been a lot of fun to coach that.

Q. You call Dani Wright Kubik?
COACH JUDKINS: Her real name to all of us is Kubik. She got married this summer. It's been hard when you've been yelling at a kid for three years and then change it to Wright. I have done a pretty good job with Jennie Keele. She's married, but she's been married a little bit longer. I've been able to adjust. Plus I can pronounce Keele a lot better than her other name. Maybe that's part of it.
You know, I'm real proud of this team because they could have got really discouraged when she went down and kind of like, What's up? But they came together in that timeout, looked at each other, said, Hey, let's to it.

Q. Knowing you're coming into this game as a big favorite, did you accomplish today what you wanted to accomplish as a coach with your team?
COACH JUDKINS: I think so. It was good to be able to have Cheesman come in and play as well as she did. I think Jennie Keele played a lot better tonight than she has the last couple games. Mallary seemed to be more in the flow. Our last game with TCU she was kind of not moving a little bit too quick. I think Riley, second half especially, came in a lot more physical and doing it.
It's hard. I mean, you know, I started seeing all those guys go down. I'm going, I don't have that deep a bench and everything. But I think it was good for us to get in this tournament. Usually the first game is hard. I don't know what causes it. I don't know if it's because it's a tournament, you have practice on the court. But it was nice to get that out of the way.
You know, when you work hard during the conference, to be able to play either the eight or ninth team, that makes it a little bit easier for you.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you.
COACH JUDKINS: Thank you very much.

End of FastScripts

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